
oiass^r 7 LL. 



McKinley 

Carnations of Memory 




The McKinley Button of 
Two Campaigns 



By 
MRS. ANGIE F. NEWMAN 

Author of 

"Heathen at Home," "An Italian Winter, 
"The Sacrifice of Iphigenia," Etc. 






LIBRARY nf CONGRESS 

Two Cooies Received 

JUN 14 1904 

__ Copyrlrht Entry 

CLASS <*- XXo. No. 
COPY B 



Copyright, 1904, 
by 

Angie F. Newman. 



Press of 

Mail and Express Job Trini 

New York 



^ 



McKinlev Carnations 



THE McKlNLEY BUTTON 



CONTENTS. 

Page. 
Preface 9 

Chapter 1 13 

Evolution of Thought Forces — Protection, the 
National Thought— William McKinley, Its Ex- 
ponent — The Evolution of Protection into the 
Altruistic Principle of Reciprocity. 

Chapter II 24 

Campaign of '96 — Foreign Tour of McKinley 
Buttons — Trans-Atlantic Liner "Paris" — Re- 
ception of the Button — London — Geneva Ex- 
position — Mediterranean Cruise — Smyrna — 
Eleven Happy Americans Cable Congratula- 
tions to President-elect McKinley — Jubilee 
Dinner on "Midnight Sun" — Donkey Boys at 
Cairo — Sail up the Nile — Guests of an Arab 
Sheik in His Palace — Visit to the Harem — 
Decorated Sheik with McKinley Button — Cav- 
alcade to the Nile — Sunset on the Nile — Syn- 
opsis of the Button's Wanderings — Tell's 
Chapel — Chillon's Dungeon — Pompeii — Athens 
— Constantinople — Bethlehem, Calvary — The 
Pyramids — Temple of Diana — Sistine Chapel 



CONTENTS. 

Page. 

— Monte Carlo — Lourdes — Queen's Jubilee — 
Dual Marriage Ceremony in London — India — 
New York. 

Chapter III 58 

Second Campaign — Revival of American In- 
dustries — Companion Buttons — Return from 
India — Second Election — Frenzy of Empire — 
Second Jubilee Dinner — Five Happy Americans 
of the Smyrna Cable — McKinley Carnations — 
Flags of All Nations — Death of McKinley. 

In Memoriam 62 

"Father Forgive" — McKinley's Life the Master- 
piece — White House Incident, from "Campbell's 
Journal" — Murat Halsted's Notes of Mrs. Mc- 
Kinley — Charles Emory Smith's Cabinet Inci- 
dent — The Motive of the Assassin — McKinley 
was Not Assassinated — The Assassination of 
Truth — Divine Copyright of Truth — Michael 
Angelo's "Last Judgment" — Venus de Milo — 
The Golden Rule — The Ethics of Reciprocity — 
Birth and Crucifixion of Thought. 




ASCENT OF PYRAMID OF CHEOPS 



PREFACE. 

Character is a world product. It is an ex- 
pression of the forces of the ages. National 
character is an index of the correlated forces of 
the nation to which it belongs. A nation is 
a world unit. 

Whenever the representative of any nation 
has so impressed himself upon the age and 
race of which he is a part that the pages of 
history are the record of such life, such repre- 
sentative is a citizen of the world. Whatever 
pertains to such character is of world interest. 
Hence it is that they in whose possession are 
held any facts which serve as a flashlight upon 
such character should regard such facts as the 
heritage of the world. 

The name of Julius C?esar is a synonym 
for the Roman Empire. Napoleon is French 
history. Moses is the Hebrew race. America 
is in her youth among the nations. Her his- 
tory is yet unwritten. Her representatives are 
making history with such rapidity the his- 



I O PREFACE. 

torian of the world is unable to trace it. But 
now and then the summing up of a single char- 
acter is the exponent of all that precedes him, 
and the voice of prophecy of that which may 
follow. 

American history has three distinct epochs. 
They are expressed in the names of Washing- 
ton, Lincoln, McKinley. The McKinley epoch 
is a part of us — a part of the political move- 
ment of the hour. The hour is pregnant with 
possibilities which have not yet come to the 
birth. Governmental questions, mightier, 
more far reaching than have ever been pro- 
jected upon the world, are now seething 
within the crucible of experiment. The 
hand of William McKinley, steadier, strong- 
er than any other, has lighted the fires 
of that crucible. In the laboratory in which 
these tests are making. McKinley stood as the 
expert chemist. His hand has palsied, not by 
his own effort, but by the assassin of Progress. 
Another and another must enter within this 
workshop of the Nation and discover the mo- 
dus operandi of individual power. Hence, the 
forces which aggregate that power must be un- 
derstood. Any fact, any incident, any record 



PREFACE. I I 

hidden away within the consciousness of any 
who have lived while he has lived, is of essen- 
tial value to the analysis of such power. 

The following sketch of the world journey- 
ings of a McKinley Button carries with it sug- 
gestive incidents of the first campaign which 
are an exponent of the international thought of 
the period. 

The theme must carry with it to the youth of 
the Nation a striking lesson of constructive 
character. It must bear with it an impulse to 
every reader to reach for the highest. 

It holds, moreover, the impress of a twelve 
months' unfolding of the motive forces of a 
character which all the world studies and of 
which it has been said, as of few men who have 
lived, it was a character without stain. 

The heroes of a people are studied in rela- 
tion to the heroism of enterprise. An insight 
into the character of McKinley, as herein illus- 
trated, reveals the dual fact, the ennobling fact, 
that his heroism was first within his own per- 
sonality. The analysis of the evolution of 
governmental obligations and possibilities, the 
spirit of altruism which marks his transition 
from the policy of protection to the higher phil- 



L of 



12 PREFACE. 



osophy of reciprocity, is incidental thereto. The 
author presents them as fragrant memories of 
the perfume of a life so diffusive the winds of 
the centuries shall bear them upon their bosom. 





HEAD OF SPHINX. 



The McKinley Button. 

CHAPTER I. 

HISTORY OF A MCKINLEY BUTTON. 

The science of mind under Nineteenth Cen- 
tury interpretation bases its superstructure 
upon Thought as the primal, inherent, inde- 
structible force of the universe. All creeds, all 
formulas, all philosophies are thought forms. 
Accepting this hypothesis, it follows as a se- 
quence that national codes are the embodiment 
of definite national thought. The student of 
history discovers in the national structure of 
given epochs the central thought of the nation 
of the epoch. All else is incidental. 

The central national thought is the magnet 
which attracts to itself all else. Individualism 
is thought incarnate. Great historic characters 



14 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

are they who have been the exponents of the 
thought of their distinctive eras. Men who 
have stood in the silent atmosphere of power 
and gathered to themselves the invisible forces. 
Not all men have listened well. Many have 
never walked the silent corridors of their own 
soul where God speaks, and so have never 
known their own divinity. Man in general 
walks the highway of passion ; is wooed by 
some siren voice into the whirling eddies of the 
maelstrom. To such, life is a chance, the pass- 
ing of the wind, the falling of a leaf, the roar 
of the tempest, or the lethargy of the stagnant 
waters. The forces of two worlds, the Seen 
and Unseen, are essential to the structure of 
the full man. He who dwells only in the 
Seen, is only familiar with material things. 
He gathers from things about him, not within 
him. The Unseen is to him the intangible, the 
unreal. It is that far off world into which we 
may enter only when the garments of mortality 
have become fringed and moth-eaten. He has 
failed to discover that mortality is the divine 
robe of immortality — the seamless garment in 
which immortality shall express itself to a 
questioning world. 



HISTORY OF A M KIN LEY BUTTON. 15 

But the man of an era, the man who receives 
the instinctive homage of all eras, even the not- 
understood homage of the unlettered masses, 
is he who has garbed himself in this seamless 
robe and interpreted immortality to the race. 

The only immortality is truth. Truth has 
its birthright in the realm of the Unknown. 
Truth is always seeking an interpreter. Truth 
is the silent messenger of God, who on the 
wings of the morning flies to the uttermost 
parts of the earth and of whom inspiration hath 
said, " Even there thou art." Every inter- 
preter of truth has felt within himself the 
breath of these passing wings, has caught its 
tones, perhaps, not a full cadence, rarely so, 
for the vibrations of untruth, of the distorted 
thought of the material man, have given a den- 
sity to the atmosphere. But he who has 
caught a single vibration of truth and inter- 
preted it to men, is he who lives when the years 
have found their sepulture. Thought knows 
no sepulture. It knows not the chill of the 
charnel house. It is never clothed in the 
drapery of night. For it are both sun and 
stars. It was of truth the Revelator said, 
" There shall be no night there." There is a 



i6 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

glory of soul to him who opens the windows 
of his house of clay and admits the radiance 
of the Divine. Such soul is he who going 
about among men, even they of obtuse vision, 
perceive the divine aura. 
Such man was 

WILLIAM M'KINLEY, 

President of the United States. The radiance 
of his life was as the radiance of an unsetting 
star, but that radiance was the reflected glory 
of the undimmed Star of Bethlehem. We are 
standing too much in that radiance. We are 
too conscious of its brilliance. We are too 
near the personality to be fully persuaded he 
was but the reflecting surface of another and 
a greater glory, that glory, the eternal truth. 

As the centuries lapse, the grandeur, the 
serenity of that truth, the immortality of that 
truth, shall constantly unfold itself, and souls 
still slumbering in the womb of Time will yet 
be born into the conscious world of Thought, 
girded about with the swaddling bands of its 
power. 

The following story deals only with a sin- 




EGYPTIAN MOTHER BEARING CHILD 



HISTORY OF A M KINLEY BUTTON. \J 

gle thought force which found its supreme em- 
bodiment in the public life of President Mc- 
Kinley. All his official acts radiated from the 
common center of the one great thought of 
which he was the exponent. That thought is 

PROTECTION. 



The following experiences of a McKinley 
button illustrate the philosophy of the evolution 
of thought forces, and carries with it this single 
note of National Truth — Protection. 

Tracing it thus, it finds its force in commer- 
cialism, but Protection as a thought force is of 
broader significance. It touches all phases of 
national and individual life. Protection con- 
stitutes the crimson hue in every flag that 
floats the seas. It is the unwritten word in 
the Magna Charta of nations. It has its birth 
in the Infinite Mind. It is crystallized in that 
undying message of Him, who, footsore 
and weary, with the unwelcome of those 
to whom He came, entered His chariot of 
cloud, casting His Mantle of Protection 
over an unconscious world, in the vanishing ca- 



18 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

dence of His matchless lips, " Lo, I am with 
you alvvay." 

Protection is the sylvan note of inspira- 
tion, vibrating in the souls of men wandering 
in the jungles of life, " He shall give his an- 
gels charge concerning thee and in their hands 
they shall bear thee up. lest at any time thou 
dash thy foot against a stone." 

Protection is the smile of the mother upon 
the slumbering babe at her breast. 

Protection is he about whose brow has 
fallen the sifting snows, whose feet have be- 
come entangled in the meshes of the years, 
whose hands tremulous with the oncoming si- 
lence is led along the narrow declivity by the 
child of his youth, now the man of his 
strength. 

Nature as the manifestation of God is the 
great exponent of protection. 

Protection is the wing of the mother bird 
beneath which her birdlings slumber. It is 
the veil of mist sent up by the river to the sun- 
parched earth. It is the embracing earth ex- 
tending its guardianship about the mountain 
brooklet, lest in its wanderings it lose its way 



HISTORY OK A M'KINLEY BUTTON. 19 

and never sing- its song to the great sea of its 
ultimate protection. 

It is the canopy which the palm leaf extends 
to the clinging vine which clothes its trunk 
with verdure that its delicate tendrils may not 
wither in the tropical heat. 

Protection is the striking, distinctive 
racial thought of all governmental 
organizations since the world began. 

It was the Tongue of Confusion at the Tow- 
er of Babel — the law of protection in the dis- 
persion of the races. 

It is the Damascus blade on the battlefield 
of nations. 

Protection as a commercial factor is 
the only law of limitation man has 
ever been able to stretch across the 
path of gray old ocean. 

It is the measuring line of the coast defenses 
of the nations — the vital, undying energy of 
national coherence. 

It is the supreme racial thought of the ages, 
whose momentum has been as the momentum 
of race progress. 

When William McKinley was nominated 



20 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

for the Presidency, Hope sat by the dying 
embers of our national faith and the Night of 
Despair was on. 

William McKinley had recognized Protec- 
tion as the mantle of Divinity stretched above 
a jostling world. William McKinley was the 
recognized Apostle of Protection. 

Thought is the world's builder. It is the 
mechanism of commerce, of art, of the world 
of letters ; in a word, of all achievement. The 
builder is an explorer, seeking new materials. 
The matter, the form of yesterday met the 
needs of yesterday. But a new light bursts 
upon the horizon of to-day. It is seen new 
fields are awaiting the explorer, a new mechan- 
ism is essential to the needs of to-day. If 
yesterday were glorious, to-day must be sub- 
lime. Progress steps across the threshold of 
to-day and at nightfall casts no backward 
glance. Its ultimate is beyond. Hence, the 
Thinker of the twilight brushes the dawn with 
a new force. The Star of the twilight is 
superseded by the Sun of the Morning. Yes- 
terday was essential to to-day. Its forces, its 
needs, its mechanism, are not negatived by to- 



HISTORY OF A m'kINLEY BUTTON. 21 

day. The consummations of yesterday fur- 
nish the keystone of this morning's arch of 
power. 

Hence, the Thinker who has well constructed 
his bases is ready for the superstructure. 

Protection is the octave of power in its 
infancy. " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as 
thyself," constitutes the arpeggio of a new oc- 
tave in a higher key and with more rapid vibra- 
tions. " Thyself " was the primitive concep- 
tion. Man hedged himself about — loved him- 
self. The race is the summary of units. 

The philosopher of the ages is Christ, not 
of antecedent or subsequent ages but of all 
ages. In striking at the problems of the Past, 
He does not invalidate their method of solu- 
tion. He only introduces another unknown 
quantity into the equation — " Thy neigh- 
bor " — the hitherto unknown. Protect thy- 
self? Protect thy neighbor AS thyself. Thou, 
O, man! hast learned the law of self-protec- 
tion. If thy neighbor has learned the same 
law, it is well. Then follows 

reciprocity. 

Mutual interchange is the new form of law. 



22 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

It is the sign of equality in the equation of 
Nations. It is the altruism of philanthropy. 

President McKinley stepped from the twi- 
light to the dawn of human action just as the 
vision of immortality passed before the camera 
of to-morrow. Perhaps, it was the prophetic 
ray of the eternal sunlight into which he was 
just entering. But he paused on the threshold 
of immortality long enough to throw the flash- 
light of a new conception upon a receptive 
world. He had been utterly loyal to his earlier 
conviction, conviction universal among his 
compatriots. The mystery of thought power 
is strangely manifest in the transition. His 
last utterances were studied. They had all the 
force of a message sent back from the Gateway 
of the Unreturnable, although rendered be- 
fore he perceived the movement of the Gate. 

Victor Hugo said of Waterloo, " It was not 
a battle, it was a change of the front of the 
universe." And such was the effect of this 
final battle of ideas. 

" Morituri salutamis" (We who are about 
to die salute you), was the greeting to the Em- 
peror, of the gladiatorial combatants as they en- 
tered the arena. Thus spake President Mc- 
Kinley, the new Apostle of Reciprocity, as he 



HISTORY OF A m'kINLEV BUTTON. 2$ 

was about to enter the arena of death. He 
saluted the world with a prophecy which lin- 
gers as a benediction. The dying man lay 
down his armor glittering with the new in- 
scription, a new interpretation of victory — 
FREEDOM not alone for the victor, but the 
vanquished. Commercial liberty, not for a 
race, but for the races of men. 

Reciprocity, therefore, is the final synonym 
of the altruism of Nations. 

The "History of the McKinley Button," re- 
veals the unrest of national thought under its 
final evolution. President McKinley, with his 
dying vision, recognized Reciprocity as the 
mantle of Divinity stretched above a world 
whose commercial unrest was dying away as 
a spent vibration. He stands as the "John 
the Baptist" of the higher Christian philoso- 
phy of Reciprocity. Hence, the significance of 
the "History of the McKinley Button" in its 
vindication of the hypothesis of thought evolu- 
tion. 



CHAPTER II. 

PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 

The transatlantic liner, "Paris" — that float- 
ing palace of the seas, whose tragic fate smote 
upon the heart of many a lover of the seas, — 
moved from the dock in New York harbor 
Aug. 26, '96. American cities, from the Gol- 
den Gate to the Narrows, were represented in 
her passenger list. These cities, all the way 
across the Continent, were gay with bunting. 
No hamlet but floated the Stars and Stripes 
from the windows of the cottages. In all the 
crowded thoroughfares where men and women 
jostle each other for place, the names of the 
Presidential candidates were officially an- 
nounced by the button upon the breast. Even 
the unfranchised classes seemed most eager to 
swell the divided currents of public thought. 
New York City floated the Stars and Stripes 
from everv turret. 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 25 

The "Paris" was emphatically a campaign 
steamer. 

We were a party of five. Each wore two but- 
tons, one upon the breast, the other upon the 
lapel of the travelling jacket, with a tiny 
American flag at the throat, when we went 
on board, and in every clime, and upon all 
seas, until we landed in America. One we 
left in Egypt, of which with its companion, 
this history. Each of these buttons bore the 
features of him who disappointed not those 
who trusted that he should " redeem Israel." 
The farewells were said. The tears brushed 
away. The field-glasses turned upon the re- 
ceding shore line with feverish interest, for 
destinies were in those waving colors and who 
should say, if " Protection " should kindle 
again the dying embers on the smouldering 
hearthstones of American homes. What mes- 
sage would reach the passengers in the divers 
lands whither they were hastening? Nor was 
there slight unrest, lest in the possible defeat 
financial panic should seize already depleted 
monetary centers and " Letters of Credit " 
depreciate, leaving the possessors stranded in 
strange lands. 



26 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

1 he Atlantic was quiet as a summer even- 
ing. As a bird conscious of its wings moves 
through currents of the upper air, so the Paris 
moved through the mighty waters. On her 
vast promenade deck, facetiously styled " The 
Public Park " of the ship, was daily witnessed 
the strange anomaly of two National Conven- 
tions with self-appointed delegates, meeting in 
joint session. Vital issues were before the 
sessions, which only adjourned when the silent 
stars told the midnight watch. The Destiny 
of the Candidates changed as the sun dial. 
There were but two Candidates, for there was 
no foolishness on board the stately ship. 

London was in a fever. Her temperature 
at the dead line. The McKinley button was 
met with averted eye. The wearer was at 
discount in the mighty city, whose industries 
were threatened. But the Londoner had to 
face it in the hotel corridors, in the parks, 
at the museums, at the Tower, whose gloomv 
halls have echoed with the wail of political 
tragedies. I believe in Westminster -they 
would have accorded the button honorable 
sepulture ! " Sealed the stone and set the 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 2/ 

watch," but for a shuddering sense the keepers 
would be as " dead men." 

At the Geneva Exposition no costly fabric 
was so zealously watched as the McKinley but- 
ton. The great Fur houses of the graceful 
city, some of which have since collapsed, were 
in jeopardy. With a high tariff on seal-skins, 
watches and jewelry, whence were the Gene- 
vese traders to draw their vast incomes? 
From the four great Gates which swung side 
by side, " Exit " was had in four languages. 
But the "Ausgang" of the McKinley button 
was as the resistless edict, " Stay not on the 
order of your going," but go. From Geneva 
our party divided, two of the young ladies go- 
ing to Berlin for a three years' course. Two, 
with the writer, went to Paris for a fortnight. 
Thence to Marseilles, where on the 24th of 
October we took passage on the steam yacht, 
" Midnight Sun," for a cruise on the " White 
Sea " of the Ancients. The ship's party was 
composed of one hundred and forty London- 
ers, Archeologists, Egyptologists, students 
from the British Museum, etc., plus eleven 
Americans. Dr. Barrows, whose recent un- 
timely death has been a country's grief — with 



25 M KIXLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

his wife, were among the number. The scenes 
of the Paris promenade deck were repeated, 
with shifting positions. There was no divi- 
sion in the American lines. Eleven McKinley 
buttons met the eyes of the obstinate London- 
ers at 8:00 A. M., morning prayers (held in 
Episcopal form in the saloon), at table in the 
dining cabin, at Sunday Chapel, where " verily 
it was sacrilege." Yes, to the devotees of 
the Union Jack. But to the true American, 
the American flag hallows any time or place. 
In the political sessions on deck, the ratio of 
representation was as one to twelve, but the 
" One " was always the winning number. The 
young ladies were always the Fearless De- 
fenders of the Faith. The English gentlemen 
were astonished at their ease of debate and 
knowledge of public affairs. The English 
maiden, graceful, dignified, charming, was, 
nevertheless, most at ease at her music, her em- 
broideries, her " Teas," while the free, ringing 
laughter of the American girls was to them 
an unknown " Foreign " cadence. The Eng- 
lish deprecated the nomination of William Mc- 
Kinley. His election, they affirmed, would 
imperil the financial interests of hundreds of 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 96. 20, 

English capitalists and artisans. During the 
entire route there was maintained in saloon or 
on deck, sharp debate upon our National is- 
sues, and the effect upon the two nations of a 
Protective Tariff. The eleven Americans were 
all Protectionists. 

At Naples, at Athens, at Constantinople, we 
learned from the American Consulates the 
progress of the campaign, and as the reports 
came in, the interest intensified and the battle 
of words (ideas) grew in proportion. At 
Smyrna, we anchored off coast, about 12 :oo M. 
To our great surprise and great joy, an Ameri- 
can ship-of-war of the fleet of the White 
Squadron, lazily rocked in Smyrnan waters, 
guarding with vigilant eyes American inter- 
ests along the threatening Mohammedan coast 
of Asia Minor. As we were at lunch in the 
dining cabin of the " Sun," the strains of " God 
Save the Queen " fell upon grateful ears from 
an unknown source. It was discovered, a boat 
load of native musicians had drawn up under 
the portholes of the dining cabin and were 
playing a salute to the English ship. But it 
was at Smyrna we were to hear of the pre- 
dicted result of the election. A ereetingr to 



30 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

England was not in harmony with the momen- 
tous occasion. I quietly withdrew from the 
saloon, went on deck, wrote on a slip of paper, 
" Play ' Star Spangled Banner,' ' Yankee Doo- 
dle/ ' Three Cheers for the Red, White and 
Blue,'" accompanied the same with several 
pieces of coin, attached them to a string and 
dropped them into the boat. I returned as 
quietly to my seat at table, and soon the whole 
company started up in unfeigned surprise, as 
the melody of American national airs floated 
through the cabin ; whereupon someone shout- 
ed, ' Three cheers for William McKinley, 
President of the United States," and they were 
given with a will by the little party, victorious 
at last. I think it was Dr. Barrows who in- 
stantly arose and lifted his glass in honor of 
" William McKinley, President of the United 
States," which was eagerly responded to by the 
expectant group. The English declared it was 
at least premature. But the American spirit 
was not to be silenced. During the afternoon, 
we went ashore in launches and direct to the 
Consulate, where the joyful news of the elec- 
tion had been officially received. We were a 
wild lot. Dr. Barrows, from the Consulate, 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 'q/k 3 I 

cabled to President McKinley the congratula- 
tions of " Eleven happy Americans." That 
night was a wild night on the boat. We sang 
American airs, decorated every available space 
with American flags, and talked to the stars 
and the gleeful sea of our triumph. From 
that hour the Americans were in the ascen- 
dant. 

We were in Jerusalem some days and there, 
amid the ruins of an inextinguishable past, the 
joy of the new world was heralded on many 
lips. 

Sailing to Alexandria we took train for 
Cairo, the city of dead men's bones, of women 
of that ravishing beauty which must be veiled 
from all eyes, lest they be spirited away by re- 
gal intrigue. 

Cairo with its four hundred thousand inhabi- 
tants, its forestry of minarets, its Byzantine 
domes, its splendid Citadel, its background of 
Mokattam hills. Cairo, a city of avenues and 
boulevards, of parks and fountains, of palaces 
and gardens, of statues and mosques, of Chris- 
tian churches and, thank God, the English flag 
and the English barracks. The most Cosmo- 
politan place in all the world. Here the care- 



2,2 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

worn business man of Europe or America for- 
gets his delinquent debtors; the weary invalid 
lounges in the moonlight air with never a sense 
of falling dew. And this is the rainless land. 
The fairyland of one's dreams. The weirdest 
Paradise of one's night visions. Cairo, in the 
winter season, is a scene of gaiety rarely equal- 
led in any eastern metropolis. Among the 
English and American residents and visitors a 
perfect social harmony prevails. One spend- 
ing a winter in Egypt, properly introduced, 
will not want for social opportunities. I re- 
marked to the American Consul, " The Occi- 
dent and the Orient meet in Cairo." He an- 
swered, " They run parallel, they never meet." 
The hotels of modern Cairo are palaces, all 
built with the same general reference to the 
street, the frontage about twenty feet from the 
street line. We were at the Xew Hotel, in the 
Place de l'Opera, opposite the Royal Gardens 
of Ezbekiyeh. In the Place before the Hotel, 
stands the equestrian statue of Ibrahim Pasha. 
Shepherd's Hotel, famed in song and story, is 
two blocks away. The entire frontage of the 
hotel is spanned to the street line with a ter- 
race, enclosed and canopied by trellis work, in- 




DONKEY BANGLES. 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. $$ 

terlaced with trailing vines and interwoven 
with flowers of the most delicate perfume. 
Oriental draperies, sedan chairs, divans, tables, 
fill the pavilion. A love scene may be enacted 
unseen in any one of twenty of these arbored 
nooks, which are divided by screens into dainty 
apartments, where coffee or sherbert is served 
to that ever mystical number, two. Here the 
Egyptian Jugglers amuse the guests with twi- 
light incantations. But the street line is the 
chief point of interest. Below the balustrade, 
on the sidewalk, the natives cry their wares, 
and all the strange sights of that strangest of 
all cities greet the eye and entrance the 
thought of the tourist. Here crowd the don- 
key boys with their donkeys. Not the sort for 
native travel, but high-toned beasts with dainty 
white feet and long white nose, a delicate gray 
epidermis, closely groomed, strings of jingling, 
coin-shaped bangles about the throat, a fancy 
chest girdle of tasselated wool fringes, and 
gaily caparisoned saddles. Each is attended 
by a donkey boy, not the least attractive of the 
two. Boys who have picked up enough English 
to advocate their own cause and with borrowed 
Yankee wit that is irresistible. Many places 



34 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

of interest to tourists are accessible only by 
means of donkeys or camels. The donkeys are 
easily mounted, fleet footed, at least when ac- 
companied by their owners, and so are more 
generally adopted. The donkey boys, with a 
keen eye to the foreigner and his specialties, 
marshal their beasts in front of the hotels on 
arrival of the Alexandrian trains, and wait op- 
portunity to advertise the distinctive merits of 
each. The next morning after our arrival, 
we were ranged against the balustrade of the 
terrace, watching the street scenes. It had 
been learned by that instinctive sense which in 
any land has an eye to the main chance, that 
this party of Americans were to make the 
Pyramids. The donkey boys, the only thing 
in Egypt not slow, were here in numbers, 
descanting vociferously on the merits of their 
respective beasts. One, with keen practice, 
leading his sleek donkey to the railing where 
stood one of my young ladies, said : 

"Miss — You — Merican? You wish don- 
key ? You ride Yankee Doodle ? " 

Miss M. shook her head and he persisted. 
" You Merican ? You no like Yankee Doo- 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '(/>. 35 

die? " While Miss M. was thus engaged, an- 
other boy approached my daughter. 

"You — Merican, Miss, you wish donkey? 
Me, me, donkey, William McKinley, good, 
good Donkey-" We burst into convulsive 
laughter, but nothing daunted, he continued : 

" You — Merican? You wish good donkey? 
Me donkey, President McKinley, good donkey, 
good donkey, sheaf 1 , sheap — You take him?" 
This, too, within a stone's throw of the Pyra- 
mids and the immortal Sphinx, and within a 
fortnight after the election. Who shall say 
the fame of President McKinley has not gir- 
dled the earth ? And I am wondering what the 
donkey boys are saying to-day, when the halo 
of his administration has broken the night- 
watch of the Nations and the Morning has 
come, when the toiler shall no more say, " I 
am weary." 

A few days later, a section of the London 
party, with the eleven Americans, took pas- 
sage by early boat for a visit to the great 
Necropolis of the Ancient City of Memphis, 
including the Pyramids of Sakkara, the Tombs 
of the Apis Bulls, the Cemetery of Cats, and 
that world wonder of tombs, the Mastaba of 



36 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

Thy. The day was like most Egyptian days, 
a charm. The Nile was at its best. The first 
point of interest is the Island of Rhoda, ever 
memorable for the papyrus boat in which, upon 
its banks, the infant Moses was cradled. This 
act was in harmony with the customs of to-day. 
Native women make these tiny papyri boats, 
place their babes in them, and swim across the 
Nile, at low water, pushing their boats before 
them. On the north end of the Island is the 
Tree of Healing, dedicated to the Saint Man- 
dura. The tree looks more like a flagstaff, 
bearing the tattered flags of all nations. These 
rags have once covered the wounds of suffer- 
ers. The patient unbinds the affected part and 
suspends the covering upon the tree as a votive 
offering to the saint. He then binds two 
leaves of the tree upon the ulcer, of whatever 
character, and goes away healed (?). Upon 
this Island also is the Nilometer which re- 
cords the progress of the annual inundation 
of the Nile. When it reaches the requisite 
level, the proclamation of the "Wefa" is is- 
sued, for cutting the banks and opening the 
canals to receive the water for storage and dis- 
tribution. Formerly the taxes were regulated 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. $J 

by the height of the inundation, the commer- 
cial and agricultural wealth being wholly de- 
termined thereby. 

After three lazy hours we landed near 
the village of Bedrashen. Donkeys had 
been ordered in advance for the main 
party, chairs and bearers for my daughter, 

Miss M . and myself. These chairs 

are attached on either side, at bottom, to a 
long pole, and four Arab bearers lift the four 
ends of the poles to their shoulders, and the 
rider is suspended midway. The day was in- 
sufferably hot, and although we were shaded 
by various Egyptian devices for protection 
against sunstroke, before we had proceeded far, 
my young ladies were succumbing to the heat. 
Our bearers, either by design or from fatigue, 
failed to keep pace with the donkey-riders, and 
we fell behind. Soon, however, we came to 
the ruins of the Temple of Pthah. Here were 
four of the advance party, lingering still amid 
the memories of an undying past. They, too, 
were heat sufferers. The entire party had vis- 
ited the Sphinx and the Pyramids of Gizeh, and 
on consultation we decided to await, amid 
these splendid ruins, the return of the Sakkara 



38 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

party. We climbed from ruin to ruin of the 
ancient and mighty Temple, still half-submerg- 
ed from the receding inundation, and wandered 
on to the recumbent Statue of Rameses II. It 
lies in a horizontal position within a wooden 
frame-work guarded by the overhanging 
palms. It is forty-two feet in length, a lime- 
stone monolith three thousand years old. We 
ascended a platform and looked down upon the 
unresponsive face of the mighty slumberer, 
whom Warner labels as 'The handsomest and 
most conceited swell of all Egyptian Mon- 
archs." His head bears the royal crown, his 
chin has a beard, his left hand holds the em- 
blem of royalty. His name is engraven upon 
breast and shoulder. Our party walked about 
this prostrate statue. He lies asleep beneath 
the palms, — his pillow a stone, — his feet brok- 
en and missing. The Nile overflow submerges 
him, the jackals screech his lullaby, but he lies 
undisturbed in his stately dignity, the colossal 
symbol of "Oppression." As we stood talk- 
ing of that fateful Egyptian night, when there 
was "One dead" in every house, not afar off, — 
and of the great caravansary of "six hun- 
dred thousand footmen" — "besides children," 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 39 

which passed this way, under the impetuous or- 
der of this Pharaoh of the Egyptians, we were 
startled by an Arab courier riding a splendid 
Arab steed, who came dashing into our midst 
with an air of consequence, and delivered a 
message to our Dragoman who interpreted it 
to us. 

The Sheik of an Arab village some dis- 
tance away had learned that a party of distin- 
guished Americans were within his Province, 
and " His Majesty " extended an invitation 
to us to visit his village and " palace." This 
was the ultimatum of hope, to visit a genuine 
Arab establishment of rank. One gentleman, 

Col. H , of London, was in our party 

and so, little heeding what awaited us, we ac- 
cepted the invitation. The courier dashed 
away and soon returned with a mounted es- 
cort clad in garments indicative of their rank. 
We formed in line, myself at the front, my 
daughter second. Miss M. third, seated in our 
chairs, which the bearers gracefully lifted to 
their shoulders. The three London ladies fol- 
lowed on their donkeys, with Colonel H 

in the rear for our protection. As we ad- 
vanced, all along the route, our cavalcade re- 



40 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

ceived fresh installments of mounted Arabs. 
Entering the village, at each angle we received 
additional numbers of dogs and donkeys, men, 
women and children, on foot or on camels, — a 
most motley group and one worthy any camera 
expert. But all Orientals have an instinctive 
dread of the box. It is " The Devil's glass." 
Beside, we were too much absorbed in study- 
ing the situation. The village was built of 
Nile mud. The houses were simply partition 
walls which divided families. Roofless, for 
rains are unknown, — floorless, doorless, win- 
dowless — for it is never cold. The spaces for 
such were filled with semi-human looking 
creatures, in all stages of Oriental undress, all 
of whom fell into line as we passed. Sudden- 
ly we emerged from the alley-like streets into 
the open court of the Sheik's palace. It stood 
on an elevation. Our bearers let down our 
chairs, the mounted, dismounted, and hastily 
adjusting our dusty garments, the Sheik's offi- 
cial interpreter conducted us to the pavilion 
opening on this court. Here the Sheik, with 
the Chief Magistrates of the village, received 
us. Standing in line with all due formality, 
we were each presented by the interpreter to 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN' OF '</>. 4 1 

the Sheik, and successively to all in the receiv- 
ing line. The Sheik and each of the Magis- 
trates had a thin drapery of black cloth thrown 
over the extended hand as a mark of deference. 
Against the walls of the pavilion was a line 
of seats over which Persian rugs had been 
thrown. Here we were invited to sit while 
heavier rugs of exquisite pattern were spread 
for our feet. Seated, coffee was served in tiny 
cups of the most delicate china, enclosed in re- 
ceivers of heavy silver, brought on silver trays 
by Arab attendants with all the obsequiousness 
common to the Oriental. These removed, on 
silver salvers were brought dates from the ad- 
jacent trees, ripe, yellow, luscious. The colla- 
tion over, the Sheik invited the ladies to visit 
his Harem, with the injunction that the gentle- 
man of the party tarry with the Magistrates. 
He led us up a flight of stone steps on the outer 
wall and ushered us into the Purdah room of 
the Harem. Evidently great preparations had 
been made for our reception. The four wives 
of the Sheik were introduced, in the order of 
their rank. They were each clad in complete 
costumes of the heaviest black, with black veils 
extending from the brow over the glossy black 



42 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

hair, enveloping neck and shoulders, much as 
a mourning costume in America, but with far 
different significance, this being the " court " 
apparel. Their arms -were bare and covered 
with jewels, large rings were pendant from 
ears sparkling with jewels. Persian rugs had 
been spread on the floor and we were invited 
to sit. As we hesitated, the Sheik, divining 
the situation, rushed out. In his absence the 
women surveyed us, examining our dress, our 
hair, our hats, with minutest care, and in the 
rich language of gesture indicated their de- 
light. They ventured to touch our hands and 
cheeks as delicately as if we were rare and 
precious things. The Sheik returned with a 
stool for each of us, fashioned like unto a 
tripod. He seemed greatly pleased that he had 
met our necessities. After an interchange we 
were invited to a collation in the corridor of 
the inner Court of the Women. Imagine our 
consternation at finding a pile of at least two 
bushels of sweet corn, parched and heaped upon 
mats upon the floor. We were invited to sit 
with the women and partake. Knowing it 
would be a gross violation of the rights of hos- 
pitality to refuse to eat, my thought instantly 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF \)6. 43 

sped away to the soul's inner chamber for 
a solution of the problem. Speaking through 
the interpreter, I said, " If 4 Your Majesty ' 
will allow me the privilege to express 
a wish, we would, according to the cus- 
toms of our own country, regard it high 
courtesy if we might be permitted, each 
to bear a few ears of the royal menu to our 
home and country, for the pleasure of our 
friends." To this he readily conceded, and 
we were each provided with a roll of the de- 
lectable ears ; but we seemed even then not to 
have met the etiquette of the occasion, and 
we made an ungraceful attempt to honor our 
host, by sitting upon the mats and nibbling 
the corn with the royal ladies. These harem 
beauties followed us as we withdrew, with di- 
vine longings in the depths of their unfathom- 
able eyes ; longings for that liberty which is 
alone the inheritance of the women of Chris- 
tian civilization. The Sheik urgently request- 
ed that we pass the night with his queens in 
the Royal Harem as the guests of " His Majes- 
ty." This was a new and startling situation, 
and the Colonel, our protector, not admitted to 
the ladies' quarter. Drawing upon our re- 



44 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

serve forces, we explained we were a section 
of an American and English party which had 
gone on to Sakkara, whom we must meet at 
the harbor a few miles away at nightfall. The 
argument was inadequate. The Sheik " own- 
ed a Nile yacht " and we should be " conveyed 
to Cairo on the following day in regal state, 
with official escort." But we urged, we were 
representatives of our Government and must 
not delay our mission. (We had been pro- 
vided with letters from the Departments at 
Washington — in response to which, we had 
been, at many points, under the especial escort 
of the Kevvasse of the Consulate. The Kewasse 
is always dressed in official costume, of Ameri- 
can army blue; the American shield braided in 
gold in the breast of the coat, the American 
flag between the shoulders, and the American 
eagle spreading its wings from the frontlet of 
his cap. In his belt he carried a sword, a 
carbine and a brace of pistols.) To a native 
in any Oriental country, the presence of the 
Kewasse denotes official rank. On this day 
we were not thus attended, but the native 
Dragoman had heralded our coming. Hence 
our high commission was at once accepted by 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 45 

the Sheik. With a graceful demurrer he led 
the way to the stone stairs amid the parting 
wail of the distinguished ladies. 

Descending, at the left was another section 
of the palace, with grated upper windows, at 
which we had observed, when in the court be- 
low, the faces of two or three women and sev- 
eral baby heads. As we passed, the Sheik 
savagely noticed the unlicensed curiosity of his 
concubines, and lifting one protesting finger 
towards the window, they vanished by a single 
movement and were seen no more. 

Again in the pavilion of the court our 
party conferred together as to some expression 
of our gratitude to the venerable Sheik. I 
inquired of the interpreter if a purse of money 
would be acceptable to the Sheik, as we had 
little else with us. He assured us it would be 
held a gross indignity, saying, " The Sheik is 
the owner of this whole province. What is 

gold to him?" Colonel H said, 

" Ladies, if you will pardon the individual act, 
I will present a bunch of cigars as a token the 
world over of good fellowship, and smoke 
with him." (Alas! that women have no uni- 
versal rite of hospitality). While the Colonel 



46 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

was thus engaged with the Sheik, the ladies 
held another conference to discover if we had 
anything about us which we could offer, appre- 
ciative of the rare courtesy of a visit to the 
harem. We examined our slight possessions 
but found nothing worthy. Suddenly my 
daughter turned to me, as if under the flash of 
an inspiration, and said, " Mamma, give him 
your McKinley button, and make a presenta- 
tion speech in our behalf." With some slight 
experience in public speaking I ventured the 
difficult role. The receiving party stood for 
our farewells. I passed up the line, greeted 
the Sheik, took the button from my breast, and 
said : " Your Majesty, I take from my bosom 
a silver button. It bears on its face the photo- 
graph of the most distinguished American the 
New World has ever known, the President of 
the United States, William McKinley. His 
brow is garlanded with the Stars and Stripes, 
the emblem of our liberties. You. sir, most 
noble Sheik, with the Magistrates of your vil- 
lage, have most graciously received and enter- 
tained the loyal subjects of this great Sover- 
eign of a mighty Nation. Notwithstanding 
the traditions of exclusion common to your 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 47 

people, you, sir, in deference to our less re- 
stricted forms with which you seem familiar, 
have admitted these ladies into the inner Court 
of the Women. You have farther favored 
them with an introduction to your representa- 
tive men. Therefore, in behalf of the women 
of my country, in behalf of the Government 
you have this day recognized and honored, in 
the rites of hospitality extended its citizens, I 
hereby confer upon you the Decoration of the 
Order of the Stars and Stripes, the emblem of 
the Knights of William McKinley, President 
of the United States." I then fastened the 
button upon his breast. 

In the exultation of the moment the Sheik 
replied, " Speech is impossible. I cannot tell 
it." Then taking it from his bosom into 
his own hands, he minutely examined it, 
touched it as gently as though it were a 
gem of costliest value. With triumph in 
his eyes he passed it down the line to be 
examined by the Magistrates. I then replaced 
it upon his bosom, and he wore it with full con- 
fidence of having been decorated at the instance 
of the President of the United States. But I 
had only increased the complications. Now 



48 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

we must remain as his guests and the guests of 
the village. A banquet should be given in the 
evening to all the notables, a lamb should be 
killed and the auspicious event should be cele- 
brated after the standard of its significance. 
He would place his own boat with skilled offi- 
cers and appropriate escort, at our disposal for 
the Nile journey on the morrow. But we in- 
sisted, our Government duties admitted of no 
delay. Having surrendered hope, the receiv- 
ing party were again in line to receive our fare- 
wells, and the grasp of the draped hands was 
cordial and dignified as became the " represen- 
tatives of a great Nation." We were returned 
to our chairs and donkeys, with the blessing 
and freedom of the village, and provided with 
an escort of added numbers and dignity! 

The cavalcade, as it moved from the Palace 
Court, was one-half mile in length, and increas- 
ed in novelty at every step. Native musicians, 
singers in the Arab tongue, a growing reti- 
nue of dogs, and donkeys, camels and their 
burdens, altogether a most grotesque and 
anomalous escort to the steamer some miles 
away. As we went on board, the vast crowd 
sent up a parting shout that stirred even the 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 49 

placid waters of the ancient river. A score or 
two of the " hangers-on " leaped into the wa- 
ter, diving about the vessel for coins thrown by 
the passengers which they successfully brought 
up in their mouths. Suddenly there was a 
stampede to the gang-plank and a rush for the 
deck. The scene beggared description, and 
only by the lash of the official group was the 
frantic effort of the Fellaheen checked. We 
lifted anchor and moved out, the wail of our 
entertainers floating upon the evening winds. 
Sailing the Nile at the sunset hour is rapture. 
Our ideal of sunset upon sea or land, is the 
amber of the sea, or the opaline of the clouds. 
But sunset on the Nile, under a sky forever 
cloudless — the rays of the dying sun seem to be 
shivered like broken rainbows in the atmos- 
phere, and their myriad tints blended and ab- 
sorbed. Here then is a full diapason of color, 
under a sapphire sky. This sinks into deep 
blue, melts into dove tints, fades into gray; 
then comes on the olive afterglow. The 
moon comes sailing up the horizon, a queen in 
yellow robes, untinted by any ochre. It is the 
deep canary shade — and then the silence on its 
banks. No vast populations. Only low Arab 



50 M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

mud villages here and there. The Shadoof* 
has gone to rest. The Sakeyeh* has ceased 
its revolutions. The horizon line is unbroken 
by shaft or minaret. Here and there the 
graceful palm and ever and ever the Pyramids 
in their imperishable glory, their long, long 
silences. All the world is hushed to sleep like 
a babe on the bosom of Omnipotence. 

The McKinley button had fulfilled its des- 
tiny. It had told its story to the anxious multi- 
tudes of the vast City of the Thames. It had 
travelled over the world-famed battleground of 
Waterloo. It had wandered through the cities 
of the stolid German, passed the historic Rhine, 
sailed with Tell, the patriot " in irons " about 
Lucerne, to Kussnacht Keep, under sentence of 
the Austrian tyrant Gessler. " In order to 
break the National spirit, Gessler hung his hat 
on a lime in the market-place, and ordered 
every passer-by to bow to it." Tell alone re- 

*Shadoof — Sakeyeh. Native pumps of primitive 
construction in operation on the banks of the Nile, 
to convey water to gardens. The first is operated by 
hand. The second consists of a series of jars, at- 
tached by cogs, to the circumference of a large wheel. 
The wheel revolves by the tread of buffaloes, the pots 
are attended by natives. 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF ' 0)6. 51 

fused. Against this fateful tree. Tell was sen- 
tenced to place his only son. and as all the 
world knows, pierce with an arrow the apple or 
the child. A second arrow, concealed for the 
tyrant's heart if the first proved fatal, was dis- 
covered. Tell was sentenced to Kussnacht 
Keep, escaped en route from the boat in the 
storm, and later pierced Gessler's heart at 
Kussnacht. From thence the button travelled 
over the blue waters of Lac Leman with its 
tints of amber and gold, to " Chilton's dungeon 
gray and old/' Bonnivard's immortal words 
lingering as an undying cadence. After six 
weary years of chains and darkness, his coun- 
try's freedom was still the burning passion of 
his soul. When the messengers announced to 
Bonnivard, " You are free," Bonnivard cried 
out, " What of Geneva? " " Free, too." ans- 
wered the messengers, and then only did the 
patriot's heart beat for joy as he returned to 
his beloved Geneva. Was there nothing pro- 
phetic in the succession of martial scenes? 

from Geneva to the Parisian capital, under 
the illumination reception of the Czar, when 
there was no more night in the gay city. Was 
it a passing fancy that even here, the silent 



52 M 'KIN LEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

face upon the canvas gave forth a softer, lof- 
tier halo than all the weird light of these thou- 
sands of incandescents, and one which should 
not pass away? Continuing its mission, this 
sublime face had attracted the protest of the 
wily Neapolitans; had halted in the Halls of 
Revelry at Pompeii, for the vision of their 
matchless frescoes, after a volcanic entomb- 
ment of seventeen centuries, — it had felt the 
power of Paul's majestic words before the au- 
gust Areopagitae on Mars Hill, which the 
winds of the centuries can never dissipate, — 
had stood in the presence of that divinity in 
ruins, the Athenian Parthenon, — had lent itself 
to the glory of the Stadion (the modern res- 
toration of the ancient Stadium) its vast am- 
phitheatre of glittering Pentelic marbles, telling 
the story of the Olympian games and their re- 
vival, " after a suppression of more than fif- 
teen hundred years," in which, a few months 
before, the interest of American colleges was 
so widely awakened. 

The Midnight Sun sailed from Piraeus for 
Constantinople, under the protest of the Con- 
sulate at Athens, and was the first foreign 
steamer to anchor in the harbor of the death- 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF '96. 53 

stricken city since April. For its protection, 
the English and American Consuls asked of 
the Sultan a guard of Turkish soldiers at the 
pier (a questionable defense) and the passen- 
gers were warned to return to the vessel, each 
eve, before nightfall. At no time to utter a 
syllable, or put an interrogation concerning the 
massacre to the cabmen or dragomen, all of 
whom were spies. Dr. Barrows had engaged 
to give an evening lecture at Roberts College. 
The American Consulate requested of the Sul- 
tan a military guard for the college. The 
College Faculty stationed twelve men as a se- 
cret watch over the movements of the guard 
during the night. Such was the feeling of in- 
security. We visited the scenes of the massa- 
cre of those two fearful days, August 26th and 
27th, when within thirty-six hours, from four 
to six thousand, mostly Armenians, according 
to conservative estimate, had been slaughtered. 
Within the celebrated " Cistern of one thou- 
sand and one Columns/' the bottom having 
been filled with earth, the Armenian silk spin- 
ners had their secluded quarters. Here still 
stood their silent looms while their warm blood 
stained the places of our feet. We crossed 



54 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

the Galatea Bridge, where had occurred the 
heaviest slaughter, and gazed long and silently 
into the sullen waters which had afforded the 
mangled victims their only asylum, and ques- 
tioned if God reigned — the button all the while 
flashing the rebuke of a country whose God is 
the Lord, and where, of all the world, Liberty 
is not a misnomer. After Smyrna, the but- 
ton had wandered about the Temple of Diana 
at Ephesus, temple, even in its exhumed and 
fragmentary glory, an architectural miracle. 
It had tarried at Jerusalem, bending above the 
Manger at Bethlehem, listening with His dis- 
ciples to the " Sermon on the Mount," dipping 
in the Jordan, kneeling in Gethsemane, on 
the heights of Calvary, at the " Holy Sepul- 
chre," — stood before the Sphinx, ascended 
Cheops, and at last rested on the bosom of 
a proud Magnate of the followers of Islam. 

Once only was its mission imperilled. "The 
Sun" was the largest steamer which had at- 
tempted the passage of the Corinthian Canal, 
an artificial water course one hundred feet 
wide, twenty-five feet deep, three miles in 
length, cut through the solid rock of the Isth- 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 'o/>. 55 

mus of Corinth — for more than a mile — in a 
vertical line, one hundred and seventy feet 
deep, straight and smooth as an arrow ; a feat 
of engineering, dreamed of by Alexander, at- 
tempted by Nero, abandoned as impossible for 
eighteen hundred years — executed by the 
French in ninety-three. The passage of the 
canal abridged the distance to Athens by three 
hundred miles. We were taken through by the 
pilot, who gave a zigzag motion to the steamer, 
which struck to right — to left — each shock 
threatening to crush holes in the steamer's 
sides and sink us. 

" Protection " was the mighty word en- 
circling the face which looked calmly down up- 
on the seething waters, up the line of the un- 
scalable precipice — into the blue heavens, and 
unto the Throne of Him in whom its prototype 
found " Protection." 

The companion button re-crossed the Med- 
iterranean, listened to the fiery words of Marc 
Antony in the Roman Forum, as the body of 
Caesar was burning at his feet, — from the 
crumbling Galleries of the Colosseum, looked 
down upon that " damned spot " where stalks 



56 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

the " Ghost of Rome " and will not "out." 
Nor can 

" Great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
Clean" from their hands. 

It appeared before the Holy Father in the Sis- 
tine Chapel at the high function, the "Con- 
sistory," when Monseigneur Satolli was creat- 
ed Cardinal, — attended the Requiem Mass for 
Victor Immanuel in the Paritheon, on the an- 
niversary of his death, — smiled lovingly on 
the flower-strewn slab in the " Church of the 
Ognissanti " in Florence, which covers all that 
is mortal of Amerigo Vespucci ; knelt beside 
the figure of America at the feet of the Statue 
of Columbus in the Genoese harbor, over which 
his far away eyes keep sentinel watch, — under 
the shadow of Tintoretto's Paradise, in the 
Hall of the Nobles of the Doges Palace, studied 
the historical frescoes of the Venetian Repub- 
lic, — in the great Casino of Monte Carlo, 
watched the game of Life and Death, (mostly 
Death) ; traversed the land of Old Castile with 
its ruined towers, its moss-grown walls and 
crumbling cities, little recking the oncoming 
eruption of its slumbering volcanoes " de 



PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 'o/>. 57 

Cuba;" — attended the great Catholic Pil- 
grimages of the Fountain of Lourdes in the 
Pyrenees, where five thousand come on a sin- 
gle excursion to bathe in its mystical waters, 
many of whom go away healed of all their 
diseases; journeyed through the interior of 
France, the life of whose peasantry the genius 
of Maillet has well glorified, for to them there 
is no other glory, — on again to the rollicking 
French capital, and the memories of the French 
Revolution and the ties which bind us, in La- 
fayette and the Civil War. Thence to London 
to meet the gaze of the potentates of all the 
earth at the Queen's Jubilee, — and as its final 
function to appear at the dual marriage cere- 
mony in London, of the two young ladies of 
the Egyptian chairs, — then again in the cabin 
of the "Paris," to our native land, redeemed by 
the button, which, losing its companion in 
Egypt, has since, and yet awaits the publication 
of this history to end its pilgrimage and reach 
its final destination. 



CHAPTER III. 

RESUME. 

The preceding history of the McKinley But- 
tons would be incomplete without the addendix 
of their second campaign. 

Immediately following the London wedding, 

Major S , a surgeon in the English 

army, with his bride, sailed for India under 
detail of three years. 

Mr. T (also an Englishman with 

five years' residence in Southern France), with 
his bride, took the steamer "Paris" for America. 

The first administration had vindicated the 
button. "Protection" sat enthroned. The 
nation worshiped at her shrine. Her golden 
scepter had been lifted above every despair- 
ing heart under the flag. The smoldering em- 
bers of our national industries had been kin- 
dled into flame. The moan of pale women 
and unnourished babes had died away into 



RESUME. 59 

silence, and Hope was the mother's lullaby 
song. 

Far over the western seas young men and 
brave were bearing the flag of " Protection " 
into the very seat of the despotic power of the 
unbroken centuries. Like the mighty ship 
amid the storms of the great seas, every nerve 
was strained, every timber creaked. National 
thought was tensed. But with that unswerv- 
ing faith in the Nation's God, which constitut- 
ed the divinity of the Chief Executive, every 
man moved to his place as by some supernal 
instinct. 

At the very height of the movement the cry 
of " Imperialism " was sounded by careless 
lips. Again the vibrations of national unrest 
trembled in the air. Piston valves moved with 
fitful and uncertain action. The scale of our 
national credit fluctuated under the weight of 
" Empire." The heart of that frenzy of em- 
pire was within the city of him who sounded 
the trumpet blast of terror. 

No city of modern times in any struggle, 
civil or religious, has been so swept by the cur- 
rents of divided thought. Every window pane, 
from the humblest cabin to the most princely 



6o m'kinley carnations of memory. 

home, announced the candidate of its occu- 
pants. All roads led to the " Home cf the 
next President." 

November 6th. It was a sleepless night. 
Silent and tense the vigils. The day dawned. 
The day of " Jubilee." 

An English steamer from the shores of the 
. Himalayas had a few days earlier entered the 
dock in New York harbor. Among the pas- 
sengers were the English officer and his wife. 

At the home of the writer, in the city of 
the dead " Empire," on the night after elec- 
tion was given another " Jubilee " dinner. At 
table sat five of the " happy Americans " of the 
Smyrna cable. The dining hall was decorated 
with the flags of all nations that had wel- 
comed the McKinley button in its first cam- 
paign wanderings. 

The Union Jack and the American flag were 
interlaced. The floral decorations were Mc- 
Kinley Carnations. All windows were heavy 
with the red, white and blue. Flags filled 
every nook of the spacious veranda and float- 
ed from every point of vantage. Two Eng- 
lish husbands had learned the lesson of " Pro- 
tection " of the two American girls of the 




Photo by Courtney, Canton, Ohio. 



M RS. M M M EY. 



RESUME. 6 1 

" Egyptian chairs.*' Each of this jubilant par- 
ty wore at dinner the McKinley button of the 
foreign expedition. The " campaign of the 
Nile " button graced the breast of the speech- 
maker of the Sheik's palace. The veritable 
" Toasts " of the English yacht at Smyrna 
were again offered and the night went mad 
with enthusiasm. 

The English officer and his bride have re- 
crossed the seas. The campaign button again 
awaits its final destination when this brochure 
shall find its place in McKinley literature. 

A new light has passed over the calm fea- 
tures — the light of immortality. The nation 
which has mourned such leader shall never 
perish from the earth. When the hand of the 
Future shall write the history of Christian 
civilizations, the name of William McKinley 
will be written as the stainless soul of these 
civilizations. 

Of all its fair pages, the fairest shall be that 
which bears the name of him who in the death 
struggle prayed from the cross of his own final 
agony : 

" Father, forgive him, he knows not what he doe?."' 



3fin flpemoriam. 

"Father, forgave!" 

These words are the unspent vibration of the 
great minor tone of Calvary, the keynote of the 
Divine melody, sounded by the lips of death, in 
the twentieth century, in the very chamber of 
national power. That note is the exponent of 
that power, under the highest civilization the 
world has ever known. 

It is the momentum of Calvary. The very ex- 
istence of a republic is its demonstration. When 
the sovereign of a great republic, death-struck by 
violence in the midst of his friends, uses the pos- 
sible fragment of time, which is his, in praying 
for his assassin, he gives the world the sublimest 
evidence of his own divinity. 

President McKinley's life is the masterpiece, 
drawn by Life's great Artist, on the canvas of the 
ages. 

It may well be said it required a hundred years 
to produce such a man. That life was the prod- 
uct of antecedent, pregnant forces. Study that 
life. Measured by any standard it is the equiva- 
lent of the highest. 

No dissection of his public or private acts re- 
veals the disease of selfishness ; although this is 



1 1ST MEMORIA.M. 63 

an age in which men's virtues only are remem- 
bered, it is an hour when the analysis of char- 
acter is universal. Yet the life of President 
McKinley, under the microscope of public ex- 
amination for twelve months, reveals nothing 
which his most ardent friend could wish with- 
held. In fact, each test of the microscope gives 
heightened coloring to word and deed, and a 
devoted people eagerly await each new tint. In 
this, men do not praise McKinley; they exalt 
his virtues. 

President McKinley 's religious character was 
never marred by political strife. In all his politi- 
cal struggles the dignity and depth of his reli- 
gious convictions were never for one moment com- 
promised. He was always found equal to great 
emergencies, which he met with that composure 
of spirit which is the certain index of trust in the 
Infinite resources. When carried beyond his 
personal conviction by the vox populi, even then 
he met the crisis with that tranquility which is 
only possible to one who has made that greatest of 
all conquests, the conquest of self. Said Cicero to 
Caesar, "To have conquered yourself is a deed 
which raises you above humanity, and makes you 
most like God." Verily that conquest was mani- 
fest in the life of President McKinley, as in no 
other man who has lived. Born of this greatness 



64 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

of self-discipline was that magnificent capacity to 
control other men ; to persuade an entire Con- 
gress, as one man , to assume a grave responsi- 
bility, wholly unconscious they were impelled by 
any extraneous influence. 

The White House correspondent "L. W. P.," 
writing in "Campbell's Illustrated Journal," gives 
the following incident, which is worthy to be re- 
peated in every text-book in the land. "I once 
said to Mr. McKinley, 'Major, you have the most 
remarkable self-control I ever saw in a man.' 
He replied: 'Yes, I have learned self-control. It 
has been a matter of discipline. Mrs. McKinley 
has been an invalid for many years. Her life has 
at times hung by a thread, and her physician 
believed I could strengthen or weaken that hold 
on life. I schooled myself, and never went into 
her presence without a smile on my face and the 
assurance in my manner that the universe was 
moving as I had ordered. It mattered not how 
the world treated me, or what were my trials ; 
I had to go to my wife as though the world were 
mine, and everything run as I would have it. It 
was not easy at all times to follow the directions 
of the doctor; but there was my wife's life at 
stake. It was the highest stake a man ever 
played for, and I played to win/ ' 

Would that some limner of the Immortals, 



IN MEMORIAM. 65 

dipping his brush in eternal colors, might paint 
that picture of devotion on the canvas of the 
world's memory for the eyes of unborn races. 

But it must forever remain in any record, pub- 
lic or private, of President McKinley as the one 
supreme quality, his devotion to his wife. Is 
there anything more sublime in the record of 
character, in any age, than the self-discipline the 
above incident illustrates? 

Murat Halsted, in the Memorial Number of 
the "Saturday Evening Post" (a), writes most 
tender and pathetic things of Mrs. McKinley. 
Her absorbing devotion to her husband is most 
gently portrayed. Her daily visits to the place 
of interment ; her sorrowful moan, "There is now 
nothing for me but to wait, and I want to go," 
defines the indivisibility of these two rare souls. 
Mr. Halsted quotes Mrs. McKinley 's words con- 
cerning her husband : "It seemed that, without 
speech, he knew a wish when I formed it, and 
our love was for every day." 

Such is the compensation of Immortality : the 
indivisibility of two souls is unchanged by the 
disrobings of mortality. The soul cannot sepa- 
rate itself from itself, under the divine law of 
unity. When the recognition of this truth be- 
comes the central impulse of Christian faith, 
rather than as now, a myth of speculation, then 



66 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

will the millennium of the soul come. Mr. Mc- 
Kinley, of all men, believed in immortality. 
His faith in the reunion of friends after death was 
absolute. 

The great fact to be commemorated in the 
death of President McKinley is that his life is a 
legacy of love to humanity. Is it any marvel the 
"little children cried in the streets when he 
died"? And Mr. Halsted has well said, "That 
was the tenderest tribute ever paid to the im- 
mortals, whose gift of greatness was kindness." 
Of this universal tenderness to children Mr. 
Charles Emory Smith writes (b) : "It was as nat- 
ural for him to send the child that was ushered 
into his presence away with the treasured carna- 
tion as it was to stop and give his boutonniere to 
the proud engineer of his special train." 

Mr. McKinley 's unwritten life is the highest, 
divinest commentary upon human action. It is a 
grateful truth, that whatever of worth has been 
lived in any life continues to live. To such there 
is no death, even in time. Mr. McKinley 's work 
is done, and well done. Its influence is deathless, 
its continuity of power unbroken. He saw in all 
men what he saw in himself. He conceded to all 
men the same liberties he desired for himself. 



(a)-(d) — Mr. Halsted, Saturday Evening Post, Sept. 6, 1902. 
(b)-(c) — Charles Emory Smith, Saturday Evening Post, Sept. 
13, 1902. 



IN MEMORIAM. 6j 

The President's dying prayer for forgiveness 
for his assassin was but the expression of his life- 
long attitude toward those who wronged him. 

Referring again to Mr. Smith's (c) "Memorial 
Paper," he gives the following incident concern- 
ing a Cabinet meeting : "A Federal officer had 
issued a public paper, in which he reflected on 
the Administration. It was a foolish and unwar- 
ranted criticism. The question came up as to 
whether he should be disciplined. The President 
had not known of the paper, and asked to see it. 
On glancing over it, he said : 'I don't know but 
this officer is directly criticising me, and you had 
better leave the paper with me, and let me ex- 
amine it more closely.' 'And, Mr. President, if 
you find he is criticising you, what will you do?" 

" T will forgive him,' was the President's im- 
mediate and calm answer." 

Such is the man whom American history will 
always honor. One of the few men whose entire 
life, public and private, furnishes to history an un- 
tarnished page, and the summary of whose life 
is expressed in the President's own words con- 
cerning the assassination of President Lincoln : 

"Whenever and however death came, he had 
done enough for immortality" (d). 



68 m'kinley carnations of memory. 

O mighty soul ! that erst was with us ; 
Men saw not, knew not, the fullness of thy strength, 
'Till the sudden obscuration of thy sun at midday, 
Left the world in darkness. 

"* * * Through such souls alone 
God, stooping, shows sufficient of His light 
For us i' the dark to rise by * * *." 

THE AIM OF THE ASSASSIN. 

William McKinley : the Man, the Citizen, the 
Friend of Humanity. 

William McKinley was not assassinated. 
There was nothing about the man to invite the 
aim of the assassin. As well might he shoot at 
a star. The orbit of the star would be undis- 
turbed. Its lustre would only be dimmed to the 
eyes focusing the smoke of the bullet. The dis- 
charge of the weapon, moreover, would serve to 
direct the gaze of the multitudes toward the radi- 
ance of the unsetting star. 

What, then, constitutes the motive of the 
assassin? Not the destruction of the man, but 
of that which he represented — the truth. Not a 
truth, but the truth, the sublimest thing of 
the ages — the only immortal thing. 

President McKinley thought God's thoughts. 
Thought, borne by the winds of heaven, breathed 
in the caves and the catacombs, caught up by 



IN MEMORIAM. 69 

the crest of the sea waves, has ever beaten against 
the rocks of superstition, to find only here and 
there an answering echo from some great soul 
on the Palisades of Being, who becomes an in- 
terpreter to men. President McKinley was the 
impersonation of truth. In him the divine rule 
of action was crystallized. He, of all men, did 
unto others as he would they should do unto 
him. 

It is the unreachable to feet entangled in the 
morasses. It is the incomprehensible in national 
life. It does violence to the law of opportunity. 

CRUCIFY IT! CRUCIFY IT ! 

It was the attempted crucifixion of thought at 
Smithfield's, at the Circus Maximus, on the Flor- 
entine Plaza, in the Tower, in the Bastile — on 
whatever wheel, in whatever fires, on whatsoever 
cross of agony — a great soul has been immo- 
lated. 

It is the martyrdom of truth, whose fires never 
die. But from every whitening ember truth rises 
again, as from the brow of Olivet, and in each 
resurrection the spiritualized incarnation has 
clearer outline, till, finally, the dull, dead eyes 
which have had slow awakening begin to dimly 
perceive it. 

And thus truth lives in the death of the mar- 



JO M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

tyrs. It can no more perish from the earth than 
can God withdraw himself. Truth is of God. 
Whoever thinks God's thoughts after Him, and 
expresses it to the world, he is immortal. The 
stiletto of the barbarian cannot pierce truth ; 
inquisitorial fires cannot stifle it ; the bullet of 
the assassin can only give it life — life more abun- 
dant, even though at the suspension of that un- 
defined and undefinable thing we so strangely 
call life. 

Hence, in the summing up, we discover it is 
thought only which has been assassinated He 
who expressed it is immortal, and his thought is 
immortal also. Hence, it is not a hypothesis, 
but a demonstration. There is no death. 

Moreover, thoughts on high planes are the 
world's inheritance. God has so adjusted them 
that they shall meet and blend the antitheses of 
souls. They are too sacred for the unsanctified. 
They are beyond reach. But they are continu- 
ally calling to the souls of men : "Come up 
higher. Come where we dwell." 

Thoughts take material form in the printed 
page. Books become the world's inheritance. 
But books have their years. The copyright ex- 
pires. The mold in which they are cast corrodes, 
and the rust of the ages effaces their title pages. 
God has put a divine copyright on the creations 



IN MEMORIAM. J\ 

of truth, the creations of souls who comprehend 
truth, and legions of angels shall spread their 
white wings about that truth forever. The copy- 
right is imperishable. The thought has spiritual 
form, and spirit is indestructible. 

The painter puts upon the walls of some giant 
cathedral, in fresco, a world-theme. The sculp- 
tor from the cold marble brings forth the ideal 
conception of his own soul. But the fresco per- 
ishes. Michael Angelo's fresco of the "Last 
Judgment," which covers the entire wall (sixty- 
four feet wide and thirty-two feet in height) of 
the Capella Sistina of the Vatican, where alone 
the Pope officiates in high ceremony, has become 
so defaced by time it is difficult to trace its beauty 
with the natural eye. The Venus de Milo, the 
supreme creation of the Greek sculptor, stands in 
the Louvre at Paris, the central magnet of the 
art world, though having lost both its arms. 
And every reproduction of the modern sculptor 
is an armless reproduction. 

Thus the material form of thought dies with 
its age and is buried in the same sepulchre. But 
the thought creation, as of Michael Angelo or 
the Greek sculptor, is an immortal creation. 
Thought, then, is the real immortality. The 
thoughts of truth man entertains in life, when he 
passes from the arena of action, will remain in the 



J2. M KINLEY CARNATIONS OF MEMORY. 

world's atmosphere as his contribution to the 
ideals of human progress. They will creep in 
upon the souls of those who shall come after — 
receptive souls, souls that take wings, like the 
birds, and rise to the strata of the full orchestra 
of God's infinite harmonies ; then, sweeping 
down to the souls of other men, sing to them 
these songs, until, at last, the one thought, "Do 
unto others as ye would they should do unto 
you," shall cause a vibration in the whole atmos- 
phere of thought, and the ethics of reciprocity 
shall be understood by all men. Then shall dis- 
cord cease, and His will "Be done in earth as it 
is in heaven" — for ever and ever. 

Though "Heaven and earth shall pass away." 
' Thought keeps its own — its starlight way. 
In Judean skies, seen from afar, 
Shone soft the light of Bethlehem's star. 
A Babe within a manger lay — 
'Twas Thought was born that golden day. 
The wise men knelt to catch its tone, 
The startled world knew not its own. 
Thought bowed in lone Gethsemane, 
And breathed its prayer for you and me. 

Great Darkness stretched her sable hand 

And Silence fell on all the land. 

On Calvary's heights, 'twas Thought that died. 

'Twas Thought the world had crucified. 

Thought rose again on Olivet. 

Sweet Bethlehem's Star has never set. 

Thought has its own eternal day, 

Though "Heaven and earth shall pass away," 



JUN 1 4 V 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



I ii l , 

013 788 319 3 



